Flooring: Resilient Flooring & Adhesives

Health Care Without Harm lists products from manufacturers that don't require toxic cleaners like strippers, sealants, or floor finishes. The HCWH specifications also prohibit a variety of toxic chemicals, including: 

• Antimicrobial chemicals. They can make bacteria resistant to antibiotics and disrupt our hormones.  It is not necessary for city department carpet to have antimicrobial chemicals.

• Flame retardant chemicals. They do little, if anything, to slow or prevent fire. They migrate out of products and escape into our air, dust and our bodies. And they’re associated with cancer, lower intelligence quotient (IQ), and reproductive harm.

• Per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). They are associated with cancer, high cholesterol and obesity.  They have been found to migrate out of products and get into our air, dust, water and bodies.  San Francisco's regulation requires carpets to have cationic nylon yarn.  It is soil stain resistant and does not require toxic fluorinated chemicals.  

• Polyvinyl chloride (PVC). It usually has phthalates (some of which disrupt our hormones and probably causes cancer), and sometimes it has lead (which can cause reproductive problems and nerve disorders), and when PVC is made or disposed, it releases cancer-causing dioxins.